Implications of the prevalence of Ascaris sp. in the funerary context of a Late Antique population (5th-7th c.) in Granada (Spain).

OBJECTIVE: To evaluate the prevalence of gastro-intestinal parasites in human remains from Late Antiquity (5th - 7th c.) Granada (Spain). MATERIALS: The study included pelvic and cranial control samples from 17 skeletons from the archaeological sites of Los Mondragones (n = 13) and Rafael Guillén (n = 4). METHODS: In the paleoparasitological study, soil samples from pelvic area and cranium were analyzed using the rehydration, homogenization, and micro-sieving method and visualization under brightfield microscopy. RESULTS: Ascaris sp. eggs were detected in pelvic samples from seven individuals. CONCLUSIONS: These findings may indicate that this parasite was endemic. Its detection frequency is one of the highest reported at group level in an osteological series from Late Antiquity. SIGNIFICANCE: The prevalence of Ascaris sp. associated with skeletal remains has implications for assessing the lifestyle and health of populations in southern Spain during the Late Antique period. LIMITATIONS: The number of individuals is small and taphonomic processes could have limited paleoparasitological findings SUGGESTIONS FOR FURTHER RESEARCH: Future interdisciplinary studies of this type are warranted in larger osteological series to improve knowledge of parasitosis in the past.

Did the Romans introduce the Egyptian mongoose (Herpestes ichneumon) into the Iberian Peninsula?

New finds of bones of the Egyptian Mongoose (Herpestes ichneumon), one from Portugal and one from Spain, were directly 14C dated to the first century AD. While the Portuguese specimen was found without connection to the Chalcolithic occupation of the Pedra Furada cave where it was recovered, the Spanish find, collected in the city of Mérida, comes from a ritual pit that also contained three human and 40 dog burials. The finds reported here show that the Egyptian mongoose, contrary to the traditional and predominant view, did not first arrive in the Iberian Peninsula during the Muslim occupation of Iberia. Instead, our findings are consistent with the hypothesis that the species was first introduced by the Romans, or at least sometime during the Roman occupation of Hispania. Therefore, radiocarbon dating of new archaeological finds of bones of the Egyptian Mongoose (Herpestes ichneumon) in the Iberian Peninsula push back the confirmed presence of the species in the region by approximately eight centuries, as the previously oldest dated record is from the ninth century. With these new dates, there are now a total of four 14C dated specimens of Egyptian mongooses from the Iberian Peninsula, and all of these dates fall within the last 2000 years. This offers support for the hypothesis that the presence of the species in Iberia is due to historical introductions and is at odds with a scenario of natural sweepstake dispersal across the Straits of Gibraltar in the Late Pleistocene (126,000-11,700 years ago), recently proposed based on genetic data.